1. Intellectual Revolutions Presentations
Which invention, event and/or movement did the most to create our modern understanding of the world?

2. Pre-Modern Europe ~500 CE-1500s
Sources of Truth for most Europeans:
The Catholic Church
Ancient Greek logic

3. Logic, but little experimentation
If a theory was logical, there was little need to test it.
There were many cool inventions in the Ancient World, but they often came before their time, so they were just fun gadgets rather than real game changers. People weren’t stupid, but they didn’t have the MENTAL FRAMEWORK or COMPLEMENTARY INVENTIONS to turn a model into a mass product. Example: The steam engine. 1. There wasn’t the scientific method, which calls for experimentation and aims for perfection. 2. Fire was made from wood or charcoal, not coal (complementary input), which burns much hotter, so the fire needed constant tending/cutting down of trees. Labor costs were so high to generate fire, it was easier to just have peasants or slaves do the work that steam engines later did. 3. Most ancient societies had slaves, so no need to innovate to cut labor costs. Yet another example of how slavery holds a society back. 4. They hadn’t invented water wheels/water mills yet, which is the second, crucial component for a steam engine to turn into a car, train or other engine.
Before its time--
Hero of Alexandria’s steam engine, 100 CE.

4. Ptolemy
Ancient Greek astronomer who claimed the universe revolved around the Earth (geocentric theory).

5. Copernicus 1473-1543 Priest who wanted to explain God’s handiwork.
Kept his Heliocentric theory a secret
until his death.

6. The
Heliocentric
Theory

7. Galileo (1564-1642) Observed that moons orbited Jupiter too.
Proved the existence of a new planet, Neptune, not mentioned by Ptolemy.
Built a telescope 33X more powerful than the naked eye.
Pioneered the Scientific Method
The moon and all the planets and stars were previously considered perfect, without any craters or other blemishes on their surfaces. This was b/c of Christian beliefs that on Earth, sin is everywhere, but in Heaven, everything is perfect.

8. Partner/Share: Is the Scientific Method better than just winging it
Partner/Share: Is the Scientific Method better than just winging it? WHY? Use a specific example to back up your argument.

9. Cardinale Bellarmine To want to affirm that… the earth . . .
revolves with great speed about the sun . . .
is a very dangerous thing, likely… to harm
the Holy Faith by rendering Holy Scripture false.

10. The Protestant Reformation (1500s-1600s)
BEFORE: Western Europe had one (Catholic) Church.
EXPLANATION: A religious movement that protested corruption and abuses of power in the Church.
KEY PLAYER: Martin Luther.
THE CHANGE: Broke the Catholic Church’s monopoly on Christian faith and the truth about how the universe works, setting up a competition of ideas. Promoted literacy (so everybody could read the Bible, not just priests). Wars of Religion (1600s).

11. Johannes Gutenberg (1394-1468): The Printing Press
BEFORE: Europeans either copied books by hand or used wooden blocks, which wore out quickly. Books were incredibly expensive—1/2 the value of a small house in Germany!
EXPLANATION: Gutenberg carved in iron 100,000 letters, symbols, common phrases and sentences, images and extra versions of each. Movable type—Word combos on a rack could be moved into different combinations.
THE CHANGE: 20 million books in Europe by 1500; million by Works could be standardized, reducing errors and making back up copies. Scientists and others could build on each other’s works, no matter where they lived.

12. The Renaissance (1300s-1600s)
BEFORE: Medieval art focused almost exclusively on religious themes and people were not depicted accurately. The focus was on preparing for eternity, not having a happy life on Earth.
EXPLANATION: The Renaissance (“Rebirth”), a flowering of the arts and knowledge, was a bridge between the Middle Ages and the Modern Era. Humanism arose, putting emphasis on improving day to day life. Ancient Greek and Roman thinkers came back into fashion. Merchants benefited from early capitalism and spent their new money on Renaissance art.
THE CHANGE: Art and the beginnings of science flourished, putting more focus on daily life.
“Legend of the 3 Living and the 3 Dead” depicts three young nobles who encounter their doubles, but they are corpses who chase them around repeating the epitaph on the tombstone. Notice the unrealistic depiction of people in the medieval saints painting on the left vs. the Renaissance art on the right.
“Legend of the 3 Living and the 3 Dead”

13. Early Capitalism (1200s-1600s)
BEFORE: Usury (lending money at interest) was considered a sin. Nobles and the Church dominated the mostly rural economy. Cities were small and had little power.
EXPLANATION: By the late 1200s, Genoa and Florence had created a Europe-wide credit system. This allowed for long-distance transactions at a time when travel was expensive, slow and dangerous. In the 1600s, joint stock companies were formed in England (the East India Company—the world’s first multinational corporation) to raise huge amounts of money quickly. This spurred entrepreneurship and trade.
THE CHANGE: The Black Death of the 1300s set off an economic boom. 1/3- 1/2 the population died, leaving empty land and capital that could be gathered into larger, more efficient farms and businesses. Cities grew and merchants became powerful, reducing the power of the nobles and the Church. Coins and paper money circulated, replacing some of the barter economy.